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I had a couple of flats fixed with the caffelatex stuff, worked nicely.The first flat was on a tub without any caffelatex in. i put it in after getting home, inflated it, spun the wheel in the air for a bit and saw the stuff shooting out, after 5 spins or so it was fixed.The second was with the caffelatex in the tub, didnt even notice it until i got home and saw the latex squirts on the sidewalls.It definitely can be a lifesaver.

fdegrove wrote:In general deflating the tyre is not recommended once the tyre has been treated either preemptively or for a repair as the inner walls will collapse and tend to bond to each other. This is why I mentioned that care should be taken when reinflating. Go slow here and chances are you'll do just fine.

So, a partial deflate (say to 50-60psi) would probably be OK then, right? That would be high enough to prevent tire collapse, and low enough to prevent high-altitude explosion.

Sounds good to me. 1 atmosphere pressure is about 15psi; removing that by going from sea level to outer space would effectively add 15psi to the inside of your tyre casing. The pressure at commercial jet altitude is only 10psi less than sea level. So 60psi in the tyre becomes 70psi. IME Air companies are slowly wising up to this in their bike packing advice. But the check-in desk staff don't get it so best to say "yes I have let some air out of the tyres" and avoid the hassle. Keep them inflated to protect the rim and avoid pinch damage to the tube -and your tube sticking to itself if you have sealant in it...

I am going to order some for testing, but don't have a flat tubie right now.

The guy behind effettomariposa used to work for Vittoria. Caffelatex is the same stuff that Pittstop is made of. It just does NOT work for me. In fact I feel the whole thing is a major PITA as it sometimes seems to repair the puncture until it faces some "overpressure" situation and blows the old puncture again.May be fine for MTB but I won't use it on a race bike.I must add that I mainly run tubulars with latex inner tubes, butyl inners are easier for latex emulsions to work with.

I do have good results with Tufo Sealant but then I only use it when a) I'm pretty sure it will get the job done and b) I intend to ride that tubular 'till it's worn.There's no point in repairing a tub with Tufo just to have it laying about deflated afterwards; it'll glue the inner tube together and you'll tear it apart if not careful next time you reinflate the tyre...

I got my first tubular puncture last week. Had Stan's in the tire for precautionary purpose. The gash was 3-4mm long and although I lost some air and the sealant was all over the bike, the tire is sealed and does withhold pressure at 120 psi.

Now, I have not ridden the tire since it is sealed, so I don't know how well it sealed it or if it will leak once I put pressure on it... but right now it seems just fine.

fdegrove wrote:Hi,The guy behind effettomariposa used to work for Vittoria. Caffelatex is the same stuff that Pittstop is made of. (..)

Hello fdegrove, one right and one wrong: yes, I used to work for Vittoria/Geax, no, Caffélatex is different than PitStop. I'd be happy to answer any further question

By all means, please do.Apologisies for jumping the gun on your product BTW. My lack of success with Pittstop made me point the finger at the foamy nature of the emulsion as explained in previous posts.

Either way, I'm sure an in depth explanation of the various design decisions are most welcome as would be an estimated success rate with this product.

TIA,

Last edited by fdegrove on Tue Aug 17, 2010 11:12 am, edited 1 time in total.

fdegrove wrote:Hi, By all means, please do.Apologisies for jumping the gun on your product BTW. My lack of success with Pittstop made me point the finger at the foamy nature of the emulsion as explained in previous posts. Either way, I'm sure an in depth explanation of the various design decisions are most welcome as would be an estimated success rate with this product.TIA,

No problem at all, fedgrove!The main deal about Caffélatex is that its only latex content is actually in the name.... as its "synthetic latex" formula contains polymers that behave similarly to natural latex, but are not latexes. The foaming effect is an intrinsic property of one of the polymers we use in the blend. The foam is just a way to carry and spread the sealant inside the tyre cavity and doesn't reinforce nor weaken the repairing effect: the sealant just happens to be there also when a puncture occurs on the sidewall, which is not necessarily the case with liquid sealants. We just made a video showing that:

Then, while natural latex requires ammonia to be stabilized, Caffélatex doesn't, making it a safe choice for any tyre, or rim or tube... including very sensitive latex tubes inside tubulars. Caffélatex has been endorsed by Dugast as the only sealant currently compatible with their tubulars (that will soon be published on their website, I guess), which is proof of that.Beside that, Caffélatex has a very good usage record with road tubeless, with good performance also at high pressure. And then, some heads-up: we're going to launch at Interbike this year an additional product that will furtherly extend Caffélatex maximum sealable puncture way beyond what is currently possible for sealants. More on that soon!

I use 30ml of Stans in my tubulars (preventive) and I've had two punctures on the same rear so far. First one after around 500 km, and the last one recently after 1200 km. The last one was quite a big hole and it took a little while before the Stan stuff sealed the leak, but it's sealed it. I run 120psi without any problems...

1. Do you normally recommend pre-filling the tubular tires with Caffelatex or, just carrying the on-road pressurized bottle?

2. If pre-filled, does this affect the ride to any degree, or the weight (again, to any significant degree)?

I'm aware you're addressing your questions to the manufacturer but the answers seem too obvious to bother a busy man:

1. Up to you to decide.

2. Since you're adding something it will add it's weight which will, to some extend, have an effect. Even if the product is well spread across the entire tyre thanks to it's foamy nature, it's still there.